"Surf Safer": NACTA initiative to curb online terrorism in Pakistan

*ISLAMABAD: National Counter Terrorism Authority developed an online reporting portal, aimed at countering online extremism, abuse of internet and social media. *

‘Surf safer’ is an online reporting portal for Pakistanis to report extremist online-content freely, securely and anonymously as well.

The other purpose of responsive web portal is to create eyes and ears in cyber-sphere to counter radical and extremism ideology in online realm.

The implementation status (NACTA Review – December 2017) of National Action Plan (NAP) has revealed that the mission of surfsafer ( link) is to counter online extremism, map and eliminate extremist content, help victims of extremism by regaining space for values of moderation, love and fraternity in cyber-sphere through community participation and ultimately make internet a safer place for everyone.

It said in order to filter social media sites and enable vigilance against cyber-crimes, `Prevention of Electronic Crime’ Act-2016 has already been passed by parliament and constant vigilance of internet traffic has resulted in blocking of 1447 URLs which hosted extremist content.

NACTA and Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) are continuouslycoordinating on this issue.

The Review further revealed that mobile application has been developed and available at Google Play Store and Apple Store.

NACTA’s Android and iOS applications (Tat’heer apps- CHAUKAS) are mobile-based user-friendly systems which enable a common citizen to report any incidence of hate speech or extremist content in form of video, audio, photo and URL/text visible to them on cyber-sphere. -APP